


the light we kindle here

by copperiisulfate, lady_peony



Category: Natsume Yuujinchou | Natsume's Book of Friends
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Established Relationship, M/M, horrible exorcists
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2014-10-12
Updated: 2015-03-26
Packaged: 2018-02-20 20:55:20
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 11
Words: 17,938
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2442845
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/copperiisulfate/pseuds/copperiisulfate, https://archiveofourown.org/users/lady_peony/pseuds/lady_peony
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>A series of stories about the horrible exorcists of Natsume Yuujinchou set in an established relationship AU.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. loop, stitch, lock

**Author's Note:**

> Title for this series from ["Midcentury Love Letter"](http://atrueword.blogspot.com/2011/01/midcentury-love-letter-by-phyllis.html) by Phyllis McGinley.

i.

Natori dislikes the cold. The cold season means silence, time confined to a house of polite words and chilly halls.

There’s no use looking for his jacket now, as its shreds were resting in the stomach of the catfish youkai they had just sealed at the lake.

Natori shudders as he sneezes, and tries to shrink into his cotton shirt as the evening wind nips over him. Lucky Seiji was shrugging on his black winter jacket.

Natori is surprised to suddenly find something shoved into his arms.

"What?" Natori says.

"Surely you don’t need me to show you how to wear a jacket, Shuuichi-san."

The hoodie is soft in Natori’s hands, and the gray material still warm.

"I don’t need your-" and Seiji just gives Natori a look when Natori sneezes again.

Natori wears it.

 

ii.

"I don’t think I’ve seen anything like that. This spot would be too dangerous for beginners like myself!"

Hidden among the tree branches, Seiji grins.

Shuuichi is learning to wear his smiles well. This is the harmless local high-schooler smile, an impression reinforced by his school shirt and the hoodie pulled over it.

The red-haired exorcist in the clearing takes up a condescending look and steps in closer to give Shuuichi a warning of some kind. Curiously, the two ayakashi servants behind the other exorcist- one weasel-like, the other a masked goat- are standing much further away from Shuuichi, nervousness visible in their posture.

Seiji’s grin widens.

Scent was usually the strongest sense for ayakashi, after all.

 

iii.

The robes seem heavier by the year. But even with the paper clinging over one eye, it’s not too difficult to put them on by touch.

What is difficult is remembering why today’s meeting was so important.

"If you’re late, Nanase-san will have my head," Shuuichi-san says on the other side of the screen.

Especially when there are other more…interesting things he could be attending to.

The meeting is dull, especially when two minor members of the clan start bickering over the rights to a bounty reward.

Seiji decides to amuse himself by leaning towards Shuuichi on his right, and whispering a line about robes and pine trees.

Fulfilling his expectations, Shuuichi keeps smiling, but the back of his neck tinges pink. When asked, Shuuichi makes an idle comment about the fires in the small room.

 

iv.

"My watch, my watch. The phone. My glasses?"

Seiji pulls them out of his right pocket, and taps Shuuichi on the head with them.

"Thanks," Shuuichi mutters, eyes still squinting sleepily, and makes a fumbling attempt to button his jacket. He’s never at his best in the morning, even if his appearance is polished as always. "Why is my first button missing?"

Seiji glances at his own watch. His usual car is half-an-hour late.

He slides towards Shuuichi to face him, places his hands on Shuuichi’s lapels, and says, “Let me check.”

Shuuichi wakes up pretty quickly after that.

Later, he accuses Seiji as the one at fault for all of Shuuichi’s unsalvageable jackets.

Seiji sees no point in denying it.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> lady_peony: this is copperiisulfate's fault for encouraging my emotions about horrible exorcists in an established relationship universe. what have you done.


	2. dressed to the nines

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Natori never brings a date to his premieres. 
> 
> And then he does.

 

i.

When they say Natori can bring a plus one to his new film’s premiere and the gala that follows, no one expects him to actually listen for a change.

The mysterious Matoba Seiji cuts a fine figure in a three-piece suit.

It’s a media explosion waiting to happen.

Tomorrow.

 

 

ii.

For now, there is ballroom dancing, which Matoba is hilariously bad at, because horrible depth perception or, at least, Natori thinks this is his excuse for deliberately stepping on Natori’s toes at every opportunity. 

"You’re a proficient archer," Natori grits out through his teeth, close to his ear. "How bad can it possibly be?"

"Worse with short-range," Matoba purrs. 

Natori leads and Matoba follows and they don’t talk about how neither of them have done this before.

Or, that it’s kind of nice.

 

 

iii. 

(Later, at Natori’s apartment, Matoba tries to kiss him, misses his mouth and gets the side of his nose instead. 

"Seriously," says Natori, but it comes out a half laugh, and he kisses him instead, gets pushed against the nearest wall and has the head of the Matoba clan licking into his mouth for his trouble.

"Seiji," he finds himself hissing, losing himself enough to let that slip, and this only encourages Matoba further, brings deft fingers to work at his tie.

Natori’s last coherent thought for the night is:  _What happened to your disastrous depth perception_ now _?_ )

 

 

iv.

The tabloids have a field day the next morning.

As does every other media outlet ever because, apparently, international relations crises are less important than an actor’s new flame.

Natori wakes up to the sound of the TV, thinks nothing of it until he makes his way over to Matoba, who is sipping his tea and smirking at the screen.

"Don’t look so upset. it’s not like you were trying to hide it. You wouldn’t have taken me otherwise."

There’s a lot brewing in the back of Natori’s head but, right now, Seiji’s hair is down, a silky curtain falling over his shoulder, and there’s a split second where Natori is distracted by the way the sun plays on it and finds it hard to care for anything else.

 

 

v.

(“It makes for a nice story, don’t you think?”

"No one knows the story."

"But if they did, they could maybe even make a film out of it--aggrandize and exaggerate how The Great Natori Shuuichi," Matoba says, wry, "was finally worn down by his first childhood love."

"Don’t be ridiculous," Natori says under his breath.

Matoba laughs. “In any case, six years well spent.”)

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> copperiisulfate: this series is brought to you by an endless feedback loop of myself and lady_peony enabling each other and weeping profusely :)


	3. symphony of us

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> His voice is a melody you know so well.

i. 

"Shuuichi," Matoba says, pushing open the bedroom door. He can hear Natori's breath come to a halt. 

Matoba carefully sits on the mattress, next to the blankets. 

"You have company meeting t'mmrw," Natori mumbles, "should be out now. At your place." 

"Your servant-Hiiragi, I believe-said you were not sleeping well."

"Sleep fine. Shouldn't worry."

Matoba's fingers spread across the pillow under Natori's head. He frowns. There's a faint impression of dampness there. 

Natori doesn't turn to look at him. 

"Once," Matoba starts softly, to the dark, "there was an old man who rescued a sparrow in winter. What he didn't know was that the sparrow could grant wishes..."

Gradually, Natori's breath evens. 

 

ii. 

_Please leave a message after the-_

Beep. 

"Can't believe I was late for lunch. The interview ran over and you were-"

Beep.

"At the supermarket! My manager doesn't know. They have thirty kinds of tea-"

Beep.

"None are the kind you like."

Beep.

"It is the one in the silver box? I checked three stores-"

Beep. 

"Seiji. I'll see you soon."

_All messages have been saved to your archives._

 

iii.

Matoba rests his head back on the couch, shirt collar loosened from his throat. "Leaving already, Shuuichi?"

"Spoiled," Natori says, even as he turns from the door to lean over the couch and meet Matoba's lips briefly with his own. 

"Ah, am I?" Matoba's fingers slip around Natori's tie, not hard enough to pull, but enough to give the suggestion. "Here I thought I could return the favor." He lifts his head closer to Natori's ear and adds, "With interest." 

Matoba senses Natori's fingers curling around the couch's back, pressing indents into the fabric. 

"Pity you're running late," Matoba continues. "Of course, I could tell you my plans for when you return-"

"Seiji. I need to go."

Matoba releases Natori's tie. "You didn't tell me to stop talking." A considering smile. "Should I call you later to finish?"

Natori glares. 

The effect is ruined when he kisses Matoba once more, almost biting down on his lip, one hand cradling the back of Matoba's neck. 

 

iv. 

The rare times they watch a movie, Matoba can't look at the screen for too long without getting a headache. 

Shuuichi ends up narrating for him then, golden head bent close to his ear. He has the voice for it, smooth and bright-toned. 

Sometimes, Matoba asks questions so Shuuichi can repeat his words.

He thinks Shuuichi hasn't caught on yet.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> lady_peony: everything I write turns to cheese. this is a new if unexpected superpower.


	4. 24/7

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> What does Natori do in his spare time?

i.

"Lunch break finished ten minutes ago. Busy afternoon?"

"Was it?" A smile glides across his lips as he sits, the one with a slightly embarrassed, boyish air. "Apologies, Aki-san." 

She makes a tsking noise as her brush dusts up his neck. "I need to request more supplies from makeup soon."

"Is that so?"

"It's odd. Earlier, Natori-san did not require so much touching up."

He brightens his smile. "I'm glad then, that Aki-san is the best at her job." 

Once the makeup has settled, her tools are all packed within seconds. But she doesn't leave before throwing a last comment over her shoulder. 

"Natori-san? Director will not be pleased if the tie folded in your front pocket is the wrong color."

 

ii. 

"A second storm spirit is also trapped in the circle, Master."

Natori absolutely did not yelp and bang his head into the tree behind him.

"Thank you, Urihime. I, um, I will be there in a moment." 

The heat in front of him recedes as Urihime disappears. 

"Back to work then, Shuuichi."

Matoba reaches up to sweep a few petals from Natori's collar, his fingertips grazing Natori's collarbone as he does so. 

 

iii. 

"I had thought," Natori says, "you wanted to discuss something _important_." 

"Well," Matoba says, uncrossing his legs. "The elevator didn't seem to suit you. Concerned for my virtue now?" 

Natori leans forward. Pretends not to notice the minute tilt of Matoba's face towards him.

"More concerned about mine, actually." They're close enough for Natori's breath to ripple a few dark strands of Matoba's hair. 

Natori pulls back to rest against his seat, feels a flash of triumph when he hears the tiniest pause in Matoba's breathing.

It's a nice car, Natori muses minutes later, as his knees sink into the leather seating when he somehow finds himself straddling Matoba. If his mouth wasn't otherwise busy, he would say so. 

They both freeze at the piercing beep of an unlocking car. 

"Where to, Matoba-sama?"

Matoba's voice is enviably steady. 

"The usual grounds, if you would." 

Natori has never been so thankful for tinted windows. 

 

iv. 

They're two steps from the bed when the 'thump' sound echoes through the room. 

The wards haven't reacted at all. 

Matoba makes an impatient noise behind his teeth. 

Natori agrees with the sentiment. 

But he sighs, pushes Matoba's hands from the front of his shirt and slides open the door. 

"What is it?" Natori says curtly. Looks down. "Are you lonely for Natsume?"

"Meow," the cat says. 

"You can talk," Natori says, squinting down at the hellion beast. In this light, it looks more like a walking turnip. "I've heard you."

"Meow," the cat says. It glances up with a too-knowing gleam and turns to pad down the hallway. 

In the kitchen, when Natori opens the fridge, the cat doesn't react. The same with the lower shelves. 

When Natori finally opens the top cabinet and pulls down a bag of seaweed-flavored chips, the cat nods. 

Natori lowers the bag to the ground. When the cat jumps, Natori yanks the bag back up out of reach. 

"I will be scolded for spoiling you. Promise me this, cat: no unnecessary interruptions this month."

The cat stares back with narrowed eyes. 

"And stop drinking the ceremonial sake," Natori adds, holding the bag up higher.

A minute later, it finally meows a baleful reply. 

Natori drops the bag and winces as the cat trods over his right foot while waddling out the kitchen. 

Later though, Natori decides that an interruption-free month was worth a bag of snacks now and then. 

"You could have held for three," Seiji says on the first of the next month, frowning over his morning mug of tea.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Omake:
> 
> *a door slides open*
> 
> natsume: [yawning] natori-san? there's a strange sound around one of your paper chains and---
> 
> natsume: what are you two doing?
> 
> natori: that...that is an excellent question. what are we doing matoba?
> 
> matoba: we're playing go
> 
> natori: yes. that. 
> 
> *the next morning*
> 
> natsume: [eating breakfast]
> 
> natsume: they weren't playing go.
> 
> _
> 
> lady_peony: An alternate title I considered was "matoba seiji, sex fiend" but this isn't from his pov. 
> 
> natori has the most difficult life.


	5. string theory

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> copperiisulfate: million-year-late contribution for the new year. hi i am a massive, horrible, no-good sap. this is what this ship has done to me. send help.

 

They have both grown up in large, cold, mostly empty houses with no one to talk to but walls. Touch had always been little more than a luxury, perfunctory where it was offered. In its stead, there were gestures, few and far between but practice made perfect and, given enough of it, one could read anything quickly enough.

So when Natori sits down beside him on a lazy Sunday and peels a bowl of oranges, it is an act of love unannounced.

His fingers shine with the spray from the skins and glisten in the sun filtering in and Matoba thinks that he has formed a history of sorts with watching Natori’s hands through the years.

He remembers them early, pads of a boy’s fingertips riddled with cuts, smudges of dirt on his palms, trial-and-error summonings and sealings. (He remembers because he would be at standby in the shadows, holding his breath in case they went awry.)

As he practiced the techniques, day and night, relentless, his skin cracked and dried from the paper, palms to the spaces between his fingers, and then, later, only in certain places, the inside of his thumb, fleshy patch below his index finger. He’d become an actor after all, all properly made up and moisturized and all.

And soon, Natori’s hands were blink-and-miss-it deft. Quick enough that it was almost impossible to catch the lizard ayakashi sitting still until Natori himself paused for breath.

 

*

 

Matoba sometimes finds himself tracking the ayakashi with his eyes, chasing it with his fingers, across Natori’s shoulder, down to his wrist, feels the burn of Natori’s gaze on him as he does it.

Sometimes, it hits him like a knife that he is vulnerable, that this _makes_ him vulnerable.

Still, he hasn’t slept this well in years and maybe that’s just a coincidence but, in any case, he tries to think nothing of it.

Natori is weaker, still, is the sum of little more than his own hard-earned but self-taught skill and a fractured house behind him, in the face of the Matoba clan’s overwhelming spiritual power and, recently at least, stronger presence.

Matoba knows it’s silly to think that Natori provides any real kind of security. Likely, it’s the opposite. His affection endangers him. At his worst, there’s a part of him that considers it, thinks of nine separate ways Natori could kill him in his sleep, stab him in the back and run without a trace.

Between the two of them, Natori has always been better at shuttering off his heart, has always been better at running, has always had so little to lose.

Matoba almost envies him. (Sometimes. _Still_.)

He knows that Natori makes him a little irrational, makes him want to tell him to _stay_ , to run away somewhere, together, away from everything but one another, makes him more than a little bit reckless.

And still, this is the life he has chosen.

He knows there is another world out there where he chooses the other life, the wiser path maybe. In that one, he cuts himself off and exorcises himself of the ridiculous notion that he wants this, needs this, lies to himself until it turns into the truth because he has always been pragmatic like that. Any lie turns true once you tell it to yourself over and over though, doesn't it?

In that universe, Natori probably matches his cruelty and they are nothing more than ships in the night, sharp gazes and sharper words, laced with scorn and undertones of bitter betrayal.

In that universe, Matoba is probably safer in his skin but he never feels it. He probably tells himself he’s better off, something like content, even if not quite happy. He probably writes a pathetic memoir at the end of his days titled: Happiness is a Luxury the Head of the Matoba Clan Could Never Afford and Sixteen Other Lies I Tell Myself.

 

*

 

Matoba’s hands have grown callused over the years and Natori’s feel soft in his now. He likes them best when they’re in his own, or on his skin, or in his hair, combing through or tugging hard; he’s not picky so long as they’re close enough to touch.  
  
Late at night, Natori’s hands smell like tangerines and Matoba breathes in the scent before he kisses his palm.   
  
Natori’s eyes go a little wider. He still isn’t completely used to it, gets thrown off sometimes by Matoba’s inexplicable lapses of affection, as he calls them.

They wrinkle his brow, a split second of lag-time and then he sighs, layer of exasperation that is really a cheap veneer over the deep fondness Matoba has gotten so much better at reading.

Natori snaps his fingers in front of his eyes, says, “You spaced out and I’m pretty sure whatever I was saying was important.”

Matoba grins, says easily, “Couldn’t be all that important if you also forgot.”

“You _distracted--_ ” Natori begins to correct, but that's all he manages to get out before Matoba’s pulling him in, grinning harder into the kiss when Natori’s hands go for his hair.

No. He’s not envious of that other universe _at all_.

 


	6. lodestone

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> we promised to share it all. remember that.

"Send someone else for details first." Natori taps his fingers against the outline of his glasses in his pocket. "Send me, if you must."

"That's not necessary," Matoba says, the words like new paper. Stiff, sharp-cornered. 

"Is it?" Natori turns around, opens the fridge door. "It's important enough for _Matoba-sama_ to want to handle it himself." 

There's a frayed thread on one of his slippers, Natori realizes, closing the fridge. Shame, he liked these blue ones. 

"Natori." 

Matoba's glass clinks as he sets it down on the table, beside the open envelope. 

Natori. Just Natori. 

We're out of eggs, Natori wants to say. Inane.

"The last two," Natori says, hands slipping into his jacket pockets as he leaned against the counter, "on those grounds disappeared within the hour. They were no newbies."

"That...frightens you?"

"I'm not," he answers immediately, a rush of irritation crackling beneath. 

No. Not of that.

Matoba's look is directed some distance past Natori, the same look he has when focused on an unseen target. 

"Please," Natori says, and Matoba snaps his glance to Natori's face. 

After a moment, Matoba looks down, uncurls his fingers from his empty glass to pick up the letter from the table. "And your schedule?"

"Just one more day," Natori says. "Get better information in the meantime. I have one job tomorrow. Then this one."

Matoba nods once, sharply. "Fine. One more day."

When Matoba picks up the pen from the table and starts on his reply, Natori strolls slowly past the table, out to the front steps and pulls out his phone. 

"Hello! Yes, yes this is Natori. About today's episode, tell them I need to move it..."

Sorry, he thinks. I never said I would play fair, not for this.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> lady_peony: sometimes they are a tsundere couple maybe.  
> ( _don't go where I can't follow_ )


	7. comet tails

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Natori goes away for his first international press-tour, and it's a little strange, having someone to miss.

 

They are two independent, fully functioning adults, Natori tells himself.

He has been away before, for days on end, this premiere and that talk show, but this is the first mini-press tour _away_ in a long time, first one internationally, first one since-- _well_ , he'd had someone to be away from. 

It would be maybe a lot less silly if he couldn't just _feel_  Seiji growing more and more petulant as his flight came nearer.  
  
Seiji is sitting up in their bed tonight, flipping through a book, which is unusual for him before he sleeps. He generally likes more light when he reads, complains that the small lamp doesn't usually cut it.

"I told you before that you could always come with," Natori tells him, _again._  
  
"So you've said. And as I've said, it's not that easy. Some of us have less flexibility in our day jobs." He doesn't sound too pleased about it.

Natori traces a small circle on his forearm, no rhyme or reason behind it, and it hits him sharply that he's going to miss this. It's only ten days but he will. "Don't say I didn't give you an out from your tedious work," Natori yawns.  
  
Almost absently, Seiji takes his hand, twines their fingers together and says nothing.

 

*

  
Seiji takes the handle of Natori's upright suitcase from Natori's hands when the driver drops them off at the airport and had handed it to the actor, and he rolls it into the terminal.  

Something almost swirls then settles inside Natori's chest, not unlike leaves in an autumn breeze. He's been so used to impersonal servicemen, and before he'd had the luxury of that, doing everything on his own, so used to moving and not looking back, to not having much _to look back at_ , and _this_ \--  
  
He gets the tags for his luggage and smiles, clandestine, at Seiji's abysmally concealed fidgeting.

(It's endearing enough that Natori cannot even even bring himself to be upset about the bruise blossoming an inch or so below his neck from this morning.

Or, the fact that if he hadn't protested right then and there, Seiji was very certainly going to make him miss his flight and it would forever be a mystery if that was intentional or not.

 _Or,_ the fact that Natori had had to stuff a scarf and some high-collared shirts in his suitcase last-minute.)  
  
It's just a little over a week, he laughs to himself, thinks that they have technically spent years and years apart before they met. Well,  _before_ \--but he supposes that doesn't count in the same way.  
  
When it's time for him to head to security, "Don't dazzle them too much," Seiji sighs. _Come back home_ , his look says. _Safe and soon._  
  
"Will try not to," Natori grins, and usually, he's a lot more calculated about his share of PDA but here, he leans in unthinking to kiss him quick. At least, he means to make it quick but finds himself drawing it out.  
  
He smiles at the daze he leaves on Seiji's face, turns around before that image can leave his head. 

But, of course, he looks over his shoulder one final time. He can't not.

 

*

 

Natori texts him when he gets to his hotel, as is the general unspoken ritual.

_> >just got here _

_> >didn't want to call/wake you up_

_> >time difference is awful_

Matoba squints at his phone. He's not ever going to be a fan of the texting thing and so Natori usually saves it for truly unavoidable situations.

He hits his speed-dial and is answered by Natori's laugh and a "Woke you up after all."

"Was awake," Matoba lies, knows he'll be caught in it. His voice is thick with sleep and it's a little past 3 a.m. on this side. "How is it?"

"Warm," says Natori. "Airport's kind of a disaster and hell of a long trip, but it's a nice city."

Matoba can imagine, Los Angeles being something like ten hours from Narita. "Well, you'll blend in. Hear that's the place for your kind."

Natori mumbles, "Wish you weren't so busy," which is his roundabout way of saying, _miss you. Wish you were here._

Matoba grins. "Maybe next time."

"But then again," Natori says, "there's probably too much sun and not enough gloom and doom for you. Maybe we should do Seattle, or Vancouver. I hear they're well-suited for vampires."

Matoba laughs in spite of himself. "Your body is still on my clock, which means that despite broad daylight, you're getting delirious right about now. Go to sleep, Shuuichi."

 

*

 

Matoba checks his watch, turns the television on, and boils water for his tea during the first commercial break. 

"So anyone special in the handsome Natori Shuuichi's life?" asks the nosy host after thanking him for coming all this way.

"A lot of special people have brought me where I am today," Natori says, rather smoothly, even if he can't properly fight off his smile.

It's infectious, even from across the Pacific apparently because Matoba can feel it spreading across his own face, fond and complicit in some sort of secret, though really, at least locally, it's an open secret at best.

"You know everyone's going to take that as a yes," the host laughs. "Plus, there were some rumours about a gala and a dashing dance partner."

"I'm sure there were," Natori says, his picture-perfect smile in place. "Which reminds me of a funny story mid-production, while filming a dance scene--"

And so, he steers the conversation and they finally talk about the movie.

 

*

 

Natori calls him afterwards, says, "Finished round one."

"I saw. You were quite the marketeer. The director is probably thanking his lucky stars, figuratively and literally."

"Very funny-- _wait_ you were watching?"

"It was your big overseas break," Matoba says. "Was I not supposed to?"

"No, it's not that. Just, got a bit awk--"

"It's fine," Matoba chuckles, means it. "Don't worry about that. You have several more rounds to go with the circus." And for all the hell he gives Natori about his day job, Matoba really does have some admiration for the way Natori fends them off. Matoba would probably end up using far less subtlety and probably make a point to terrify anyone who so much as looked at him wrong.

Natori now seems to settle some on the other end of the line, evidenced when he says, airily, "So you haven't burnt the place down, right?"

"Yes. As a matter of fact I am currently residing in a pile of ashes." He doesn't need to see Natori's face to picture his glare. 

"Well, please clean it up before I get back," Natori plays along, talks for a few more minutes about the upcoming drive to Vegas, which he already apparently feels too old for in his twenties and his next flight, which is to the Midwest or something. He says he got a nice view of the local skyline, that he'll send a picture. And there's more, about the Japanese restaurant from the night before, although the food back home is still tons better.

Matoba hums and interjects at the appropriate points, but mostly just listens, to his voice, even as he loses track of the words themselves.

 

*

 

The next week is a bit of rinse, repeat.

Natori sends him pictures intermittently, texts more than he calls, much to Seiji's chagrin, but with his hectic schedule and roaming charges, Seiji can't be as annoyed as he would like.

Seiji is only able to catch odds and ends of two more interviews. They mostly recycle the questions anyway.

Natori puts on a cheery enough face through it all because the acting comes second-nature but Matoba knows his tells. He can see when Natori's getting bored or verging on irritated when an interviewer makes some borderline culturally ignorant joke and expects him to laugh or asks about his personal life for what Natori later tells him is the _fifteenth time this week_ when he's in his hotel room in New York, half asleep, and finally has the time to call.

Seiji just laughs and says they probably just want in for themselves, which earns him a groan and and "I don't know if that's supposed to make me feel better but honestly, _American media_."

"All press is good press," Seiji says.

"No fun exorcist jobs behind my back?" Natori yawns.

"Nothing terribly exciting," and Seiji's telling the truth. He wonders if there had been, would he have lied? Doesn't really know. 

"I miss you," Natori mumbles, an exhausted non sequitur.

Seiji falls silent for a moment and, before he can think to say anything, Natori's already asleep on the other end of the line.

 

*

 

The only reason Seiji doesn't show up to the airport is because Natori explicitly told him not to leave in the middle of the workday through ridiculous rush-hour traffic and that the agency had already set him up with a ride. 

And so, Seiji comes home to find one jet-lagged Natori Shuuichi passed out in their bed, snoring softly, fully-clothed, shoes and all.

Seiji shakes his head and tugs off Natori's shoes. He puts away the skewed glasses and drapes a blanket over him. There will be ample time to get him out of the rest of it later.

For now, he does the most reasonable thing there is to do.

He joins him.

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> copperiisulfate: The first draft of this was actually written on a plane. The airport Natori is referring to is LAX, which is, in fact, a complete disaster. In other news, I can't even be bothered to apologize anymore for the self-indulgent cheeseball I've become with respect to this AU.


	8. this serves two

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The saga of Matoba Seiji's kitchen adventures.

He's memorized rituals more difficult than this.

Matoba flips to the correct page, scans it again.

And again.

There are only five steps listed.

His results look nothing like the picture on page 3 of _Kumiko's Cutie Kitchen Cookbook (Become a Chef in 10 Days!)_.

There are children who know how to do this. Then again, his childhood could not be categorized as anywhere near the line of normal.

The sound of the phone bursts into the kitchen. He picks it up from his pocket without bothering to check the front.

There's only one person who could call him at this time. He had taken pains to make this very clear to the limited few in his contacts.

"Hello?

I know. So you've said for the past 2 days.

No takeout today. I'm certain."

Back into his pocket the phone goes.

Viewing the open container with some suspicion, he slips the rice paddle into the middle of steaming white grains.

He turns his wrist and tries to flip the rice. The paddle refuses to cooperate.

Instead of 'folding over a portion fluffier than a happy cloud' the grains cling to the paddle in stubborn clumps, and Matoba almost hisses when his wrist nearly touches the still-hot rim of the open rice cooker.

The rice paddle ends up dropped into the container.

Matoba frowns. The rice remains unintimidated.

It's too sticky to be shaped, then.

"Don't frown so much, Seiji," Natori says later, around a mouthful of dinner, "you'll get lines."

Matoba swallows his bite of unusually chewy rice. "Does it matter if I do? You have enough looks for the both of us."

He's still not used to it, sitting at a table like this, Shuiichi's leg almost pressed to his, save for the sliver of space between their chairs.

At least the eggs are acceptable. Likewise, it's hard to make vegetables turn out messy.

Matoba hasn't had much practice with food before. Not with the servants at the clan's disposal, and money taking up the rest of the spaces beyond the clan's reach.

In this case, he can practice.

He has the time.

 

*

 

The meetings that day had run longer than he expected. Granted, his day job is neither as erratic or time-consuming as Natori's. Even so, there are still some responsibilities Matoba Seiji cannot sidestep.

He wakes to the sound of a bag crinkling as it thumps onto the table. "Seiji?"

Lifting his head up, Matoba blinks against the brightness from the overhanging lamp.

"You're back," Matoba says. In this light, Shuuichi's hair is mussed, eyes showing something gentler from his usual careless charm. It's the same look he has most mornings.

"You should be hungry," Natori says, waves to the bag on the table as he slides into his chair on Matoba's right.

"There isn't the need," Matoba answers, turns to nod at the counter behind him. The light on the cooker is dim.

The button. He hadn't pushed the button.

Matoba stands, slips back the packaged sheets of seaweed into the cabinet above the cooker. Manages to close the cabinet without too much force.

He's still standing when Natori reaches out a hand to curl around Matoba's right wrist, tugs him lightly back towards the table.

"You'll waste away if you don't have something. And I would be the only one brave enough to deal with your ghost hiding all my hats." Natori frowns half-mockingly. "I wouldn't be able to go out alone to my side jobs, not without a disguise for my pretty face."

There's something tempting to that thought that Matoba doesn't want to voice.

He sits and Natori opens the bag.

They finish the convenience store bread with one of Natori's drama reruns in the background.

Matoba manages to keep from laughing too much, while Natori threatens to swipe the curry bread from him.

 

*

 

He has all the ingredients that the elderly Ms. Yamada had advised him to buy after she saw him stand, unmoving, in front of the grocery shelves for twenty minutes.

He looks at the three bowls of separate stuffing ingredients.

Now, the final step.

Kumiko should know what to do now.

_Remember, the rice must be at the perfect temperature! It should still be warm and passionate as a maiden's heart, or the filling will not stick well!_

The perfectly washed, perfectly plump rice is now cool to the back of Matoba's hand.

There is a brief minute in which he toys with the idea of taking the cooker out back and using it for target practice.

It's fine, Natori laughs later, says he's had worse when he tried cooking for himself.

Matoba wants to point out that "fine" isn't good enough. But Shuuichi is smiling in the exact way he doesn't in his press photos and Matoba feels knots untangle behind his ribs, smooth out like a length of silk.

They end up eating the fillings as toppings of bowls of rice.

Natori vocally expresses his displeasure with the umeboshi. He's wearing a grey sweatshirt a little too short for his frame, sleeves pulling up almost to his elbows.

Matoba picks the umeboshi off Natori's bowl to his own. Brings the salted plum up to his mouth and rolls it around his tongue, considering.

"It's not that sour," Matoba says.

"Isn't it? You should share," Natori murmurs, his grin sly, and leans over.

 

*

 

He ignores the heat, and presses the second corner until it molds correctly to match the other two. The bowl of warm water on the counter is marked with cloudy circles.

The shapes have evened out as he finally finishes and the rows of triangles on the plate look edible.

Five plain, only coated lightly with salt. Five stuffed.

Some have umeboshi hidden in them. Shuuichi could start to appreciate traditional things once in a while.

"You missed some here," a voice says, familiar and amused, behind him. Natori tilts Matoba's forearm upwards to reveal speckles of rice stuck on the line of his wrist.

"What of it?" Matoba says, checks his rolled sleeves for any others.

Natori pulls Matoba's arm a little higher, brings his lips close to Matoba's wrist and sweeps it clean.

Matoba stands, aware only of Natori's head bent before him, the rush of warmth humming in his veins.

Natori releases Matoba's arm and looks up, undeniably flustered. Matoba suspects his own look is equally undignified.

"Your hands," Natori says after a moment, his eyes widening as they flicker to Matoba's palms, both reddened and painful-looking.

"They'll recover," Matoba says.

He doesn't mind the soreness that much, not with Natori's fingers idly stroking over his palms, both their hands resting in the basin of cool water.

Sometimes, he wonders to himself how much he would be willing to give to keep this, keep _Shuuichi_ here, hands wrapped with his own.

Whatever it demands, something whispers in him, fierce and unwavering. Whatever it asks for, I will give. More, and even more.

Matoba once paid far steeper prices for far less reward.

 

*

 

Matoba's phone vibrates twice in his right pocket. Automatically, his hand pulls out the phone, flips it open to see a series of new texts.

_finished lunch!_

This is followed by a picture of an empty box.

_even the umeboshi T-T_

_ps the shoot should finish by 6_

Matoba closes the message, smiles behind the back of his hand.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> lady_peony: whatever fluff i generously sprinkle out for these two can absolutely be blamed on my constant, never-ending supply of kdramas
> 
> A lot of whatever research I did can be credited to here: http://www.justhungry.com/2003/12/obento.html


	9. choukei: part 1

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Natori does some spring cleaning.

.111.

There’s a box on the top shelf, coated with half an inch worth of dust. 

Natori shifts the step-ladder so that he can reach it. It looks like worn down green cardboard, a little smaller than a shoebox, but there’s nothing specifically sealing it. He considers asking Seiji if it might be anything worth keeping but finds himself absently opening it instead. 

Inside, there is--

Paper. 

A lot of paper. Scraps of paper, some neatly torn, others haphazard. 

Coming from his lineage, there isn’t much about paper that Natori finds worth writing home about but, here, something catches his eye. 

He quickly shuffles through a few pieces near the top and thinks that there must be at least several dozen, if not more. Each of the scraps also has been written on, neat calligraphy on some, a tired script on others, a rushed scrawl, and so on.

And well, he would recognize that script anywhere.

He sits down on the floor, almost forgets the dust settling around him entirely, as he picks up the piece of paper nearest to the top as delicately as he can to inspect it more closely.

 _Shuuichi_ , it says. _When will you return?_

 

.0. 

“A six petal pattern,” Natori mutters, looking from the stems in one hand and the open scroll in the other. The shape of the flowers are similar--Natori squints--but the number isn’t right. He lets the stems fall onto the grass. “Usually found in shaded woods. Those found beneath mossy cedar trees tend to be the most potent.” 

He shades his eyes against the glare of the sun. Two good hours of light left at least, enough time to find the herbs and return before dinner. 

He keeps walking until the cattails clinging to the hem of his jacket give way to denser underbrush, branches brushing past his neck, his shoulders, walks to where the sunshine thins out by the shadows of towering trees. 

The next thing Natori senses: a burn of white light. 

Blue afterimages spark under his eyelids. The rushing of a wind as ferocious as any river current. 

He tilts over helplessly, one arm pressed over his face to block the light. As he falls, he lands on his other arm, feels his elbow hit the side of his ribs as momentum pushes him forward. 

The world is a formless blur around him. 

Until his back rolls painfully over a bump in the ground, then another and stops. 

Natori lets out a breath. In his line of vision, bits of sky peek from between leaves glazed with the deep gloss of late summer, and there’s a familiar face, fuzzy at the edges from the sunlight behind him. 

Matoba is perched on a tree branch above, staring down at him with an unexpected calmness. His bow is slung over his shoulder, both his legs dangling a little beneath the branch. 

“Shuuichi-san,” he says. 

Natori wants to get up and walk away, away from someone who could call his name with that tone, casual and proprietary. 

Instead, he struggles to his feet, straightens his shoulders, and meets Matoba’s stare.

He doesn’t let himself wince, even with the bruises he can feel forming beneath his clothes. He thinks his right shoulder may have twisted a little when he fell. It’s nothing too serious. Not as bad as the last time he had done a sealing. 

Natori feels a noticeable stinging on the right side of his face, which had started when he had hit the ground. He raises a hand to his cheek and it comes away clean. Scratched then, but not badly enough to bleed. 

Natori sucks in a breath when he feels the lightest pressure of fingers on the scrape.

Matoba is suddenly there, his thumb resting on Natori’s left cheekbone, fingers curled around Natori’s jaw. 

The focus in Matoba’s gaze as he peers up at Natori is disconcerting. 

“Lucky,” Matoba remarks, “that nothing struck your eyes.” 

Natori refuses to step away. He has a few inches on Matoba in height, he notices. Yet something about Matoba’s presence negates whatever advantage that offers. 

“Why here?” Natori says. “Are there not enough spare trees to be knocked about at home?”

“The rights to these grounds” Matoba says, “belong to the Matoba clan. I had meant to practice in a suitably isolated location. This was the most convenient choice.”

“ _All_ of these grounds?” Natori says, flat. 

“I did not intend to be so careless as to cause you injury,” Matoba says. His hand withdraws from Natori’s face. His eyes do not. “If there is something I may do to make amends...” 

“Seiji,” Natori says, and snaps his mouth shut.

Was it because Matoba was being unexpectedly chatty? 

“Teach me,” Natori says, expecting Matoba to laugh or turn him down bluntly. There’s no reason, no reason at all for a son of the Matoba clan to want to teach a Natori exorcism techniques. 

Matoba looks at him. 

“Teach me,” Natori says, clearer, “what you were practicing.” He gestures to the stump next to him, half of it crumbled like a pile of shaved daikon, the remains of a paper charm and an arrow resting on top. 

Matoba turns his face to look past Natori’s hand and when he turns back, he smiles like Natori’s passed a test.

 _Want to team up with me?_ Natori hears, echoing in his mind. 

“I’m not going to work for you,” Natori says. “But I need to learn as much as I can, from everyone I can. If that’s how I can become stronger, then I will.”

“Sensible,” Matoba says. “We’ll begin tomorrow.” 

The first note comes after school the next day, just as Natori walks past the gate. It slams into his forehead, and Natori almost panics before he peels the paper note off and reads the sharp, neat handwriting.

 _Shuuichi-san. 4 pm today. Same place._

Natori goes.

Matoba Seiji is not what he expected as a teacher. He’s patient, even if Natori can sense flickers of amusement from time to time whenever he asks Seiji a question. 

When the next note comes the next day, Natori slips it into his bag with the first one.

In the middle of Matoba’s explanation on the third step for an exploding charm, Natori blurts out, “Why today, again? Why not just one lesson?” 

Natori may kick himself later for this, but he needs to know.

Matoba stops and looks up, dark bangs shielding half his profile from Natori. “Was one lesson really enough? Do you know all you want to know, Shuuichi-san?”

Natori opens his mouth. Looks down at his arm and watches the lizard creep past his elbow under his shirt sleeve.

He looks up again to see Matoba waiting, face blank as the unmarked charm paper pinned beneath Matoba’s palm. 

“No,” Natori says at last. 

So Natori returns the day after that. And the next day. And the next. 

And Seiji keeps sending him notes, keeps waiting for him in the same field, keeps calling him Shuuichi-san. 

 

.3. 

“Well, well, Shuuichi-san. Don’t you look all the worse for wear today?”

Natori rolls his eyes at the familiar voice, turns to his side to see Matoba Seiji fall into step with him. “I thought I told you I didn’t want anything to do with you.” He can’t quite figure out why the young Matoba heir bothers with him. He had assumed that their time in each other’s company would be limited to perfecting Natori’s technique. 

Seiji’s smile cracks but only fractionally and Natori would have guessed it has something to do with what he’s said but Seiji’s eyeing his collar, which is all wrinkled and bunched up and then, his eyes wander to the corner of Natori’s mouth. 

“What?” Natori snaps.

“You are bleeding,” Seiji points out serenely, narrows his eyes as if inspecting the source more closely and then reaches out for Natori’s jaw. The point of contact is merely a brush of fingers, the vaguest of touch, but it’s also sharp, sudden, and Natori flinches away as if burned. 

The alarms in his head from earlier are still going off and he’s not used to it--especially not so soon after the kind of touch that was grabbing him by his collar, connecting knuckles to his face, laughing and jeering all the while. 

“It’ll wash off,” Natori grumbles.

“And how did you land yourself in this predicament anyhow?” 

Natori barks a laugh. “You learn to keep your mouth shut after a while, growing up in a house where everyone thinks you’re just acting out half the time.” Seiji says nothing and Natori shakes his head. “Not that you would--never mind. I tried to help someone. Pushed them out of the way when I saw something--a yokai, I was sure. Of course, the punk thought I was picking a fight.”

“Did you attempt to exorcise it?”

“Yes, with half my class watching, that would have been a great idea,” Natori says, wry as ever, and then, somewhat more self-consciously, “figured it might be worth a shot after hours though.” 

Seiji glances at his neck. “After you clean up the blood on your shirt, you mean?”

Natori groans, didn’t realize it had gone from his lip to his collar, swears under his breath. “That’s going to go over wonderfully,” thinking suddenly of his father. 

“Or we could just take a detour to the Matoba estate, which is closer. You can get a change of clothes and we could seal that troublemaker of yours. More efficient, wouldn’t you say?” 

“I swear,” Natori hisses, “if this is some underhanded plan to make me join your clan--”

Seiji has the audacity to laugh, and it’s the lightest and airiest thing ever and makes Natori want to punch him a little, square in his delicate-looking face. 

“No underhanded plans,” Seiji chirps. “Not today. Promise.”

 

.36.

Natori shakes the bottle in his hand, turning it over.

Not even a drop is left. 

Natori swallows once, feels heated air scrape down the column of his throat. The lizard beneath his skin is resting behind his left ear, barely shifted from its position this morning on the line of his neck. 

He can feel the ends of twigs scratching at his ankles inside his shoes, brings up a slow hand to flick away the film of sweat from his cheek. When he slips the canteen back into his pack, the bag drags like it’s filled with river stones and not the carefully rationed paper that he had packed that morning.

The grass shivers languidly in the heat, broken up by the chirps of hidden crickets. 

It’s hot enough that neither man nor spirits feel like moving today. 

Seiji included. 

Natori steps back into the shade, bends one knee to avoid the low-hanging branches. 

Seiji is lying down on the grass, half of his side propped up on one elbow. His neatly wrapped bow is set against the tree trunk shielding him. 

He looks perfectly at ease, even as Natori reminds himself how agile Seiji really is, how quickly he can slip from rest to fluid action, bow ready to strike, in the space of a single breath. 

Seiji’s eyes are half-lidded, although the words he’s muttering under his breath are a rush of concentration. His left palm is upturned, the paper figure resting in its center, rising up to spin in cautious revolutions. 

After half a minute, it zips away from Seji’s palm to sink to rest inches away from Natori’s wrist. 

“Too much power,” Seiji says, “not enough control.” 

Natori would normally feel a twinge of pride at this. He can just about handle one paper chain now, accurately enough to identify a location and return to him. Their range--well, their range he was still working on.

Seiji sinks down so half his face is in the grass, dark hair slipping over his eyes. Seiji knows so much more than Natori does, about charms and chants, the signs to protect and signs to harm. Not that he always needs to know them. Sometimes his presence alone was enough to scare away the lower-level yokai.

Natori is aware of this, knows he has to study harder just to keep up with the spells Seiji has been absorbing since he was old enough to speak. 

It’s easy to forget. Their ages are about the same. As for the gaps in their powers--not quite. Not yet. 

Natori bats away another piece of paper floating around his face, finally catches it between his fingers. “Stop that.” 

“Like you could stop me.” Seiji’s voice sounds lower than normal, with a thin, hazy quality. 

Come to think of it, did Natori even see Seiji drink something once?

Both of them had been staking out in the forest for over an hour. Maybe two.

“Get up,” Natori says, and watches Seiji turn over, eyes still closed.

“Go on home, Shuuichi-san. I’ll stay here. I may just claim the bounty myself.”

“Just get up,” Natori says, resists the urge to kick Seiji’s knees, just a little. 

Seiji cracks open one eye to peer up at Natori, and finally rolls over, stands. He says nothing as he picks up his bow, as Natori walks them out of the meadow.

When the greenery fades into the packed line of a road, then a bus stop, Natori stops.

“Get something,” Natori says, not looking at Seiji. 

“Get what?” Seiji answers.

“The vending machine,” Natori says, points at the rows of water and cans and juice in prim rows, safe and shining behind glass, despite the dusty road. “A drink. From the vending machine. You would be a sad excuse for an exorcist if a yokai got you because you were dizzy from dehydration.” 

Seiji tucks his hands into his pockets, looks at the machine like it’s a complicated calculus equation.

He tips his head to the side, towards Natori, and shrugs. “Don’t have money.” 

“How do you- how can you not?” Natori says, baffled. 

“Never needed it,” Seiji says. “Never needed to use one of these, either.” 

Natori moves up to the the machine, nudges Seiji out of the way with his shoulder. 

“Fine,” Natori says under his breath. “Never needed to use a vending machine? Watch.” 

He fingers the coins in his wallet. Just enough for one drink. One it is. 

He feels Seiji’s eyes over his shoulder, directed on his hand as he slips the money in, hovers a finger to push the button. Seiji’s face looks less displeased when he hovers over the third drink, so he pushes it, hears the bottle thunk down.

Natori is careful not to get his sleeve caught on the edge of the flap when he pulls out the drink. He twists the cap open and tilts it to his lips.

The tension flows from his shoulders and the tea sweeps down his tongue, soothing most of the dryness.

“My turn?” Seiji says, voice still low. It nearly sounds like sulking.

Natori hands the bottle over. Their fingers slide against each other for a moment as the bottle slips into Seiji’s hand. 

Natori watches him study the label: Special House Barley Tea ~Refreshing 110%!~ on the bottle, before he opens it. He raises it to his mouth with a sideways glance to Natori, and drinks. 

Seiji’s neck is pale between the black of his hair and his collar curled around him, still buttoned despite the heat. Natori watches almost half the bottle disappear before Seiji stops.

“How much do I owe you for this, I wonder?” Seiji says, licks his lips once, as he moves the bottle away. The same bottle, Natori remembers, which had been pressed to his own lips seconds before, the tea flowing easy and sweet down his throat. 

Natori only has trouble responding because his mouth is dry. 

It’s only the heat. 

 

.48.

They don’t talk about it much. 

Or rather they do. Barely. In half comments, lightly dropped phrases, like the words that float between the traced circle on the earth and Natori’s first inhale of breath. 

Natori is running his hands through the ashes in the middle of the still-smoking circle, staining his fingertips powdery gray. 

“A lot of the spells you cover,” Natori starts slowly, “tend to be more destructive, don’t they?”

“You’re wondering,” Seiji says, “why we’re not covering more, ah, defensive techniques?”

Seiji’s shadow is stretched thin, and it folds when he drops to crouch down next to Natori so they’re at equal heights. Seiji drags one finger down the circle, stirring up dust to split it in perfect halves.

“Tell me, Shuuichi-san,” Seiji says, brings up one hand to push back the hair on his right side. “If your shields are strong, perhaps the strongest, what if they still fail to hold when an ayakashi strikes for your face?” 

Natori doesn’t understand, at first. Until he puts it together: the whispers he had heard in the last meeting, the absence of some of Matoba’s older clan relatives, the berth they give him when Matoba walks past, not just due to begrudging respect. 

There is fear, thick as smoke, and just as suffocating. 

_Unlucky_ , Natori hears in echoes, constant as the rustle of ocean waves. 

Natori remembers a shadow descending, five times his own height, waiting jaws and empty eyes. 

_Last time, you had saved me._

And if you needed, I could. I would want to do the same. 

Natori doesn’t say this. There are some debts that are understood without words. This was, is one of them. Seiji has been with Natori for longer than he’s needed to be, and he still hasn’t asked anything of Natori, hasn’t asked _for_ anything from him. 

Natori looks up when he senses Seiji stand. “Listen, Shuuichi-san,” Seiji says. “The average clan head is crowned at 30. They’re counted as lucky if they see the next decade.” He pulls back his lips from his teeth in something like a smile. “The time is still far away, and I intend to go farther.” 

“With this,” Natori says, touches on the shadow shape curled on his left forearm, “would I be lucky to make it to the next year?”

He’s joking. Mostly.

“You will,” Seiji says immediately, flashing his glance to Natori. “You will.” 

“You seem confident,” Natori says, hears the same ringing in Seiji’s voice like a vow, the same iron in _l won’t let it fall._

“Here,” Seiji says, “give me your arm.” 

Natori does, and Seiji pulls him up.

Seiji wraps his fingers around the lizard, which doesn’t move. Natori watches his head tilt forward and his lips move, whispering a familiar chant for purification.

He doesn’t feel anything. 

Only the warmth of archery-callused fingertips on skin. 

“It’s not outright harmful,” Seiji says, with careless, smooth certainty. “Satisfied, Shuuichi-san?”

He releases Natori’s arm, turns away to clean the traces of their circles on the ground. 

Natori should thank him, he supposes. 

“Seiji--” he starts, and nearly stumbles when he steps too hard on a piece of paper underfoot, the surface too slippery to maintain balance. 

Natori is prepared to pinwheel into the ground, at least until Seiji’s hand shoots out to grip Natori’s left shoulder, streaking smudges of ink and dirt on Natori’s white shirt. 

“Thank you,” Natori says, even if it’s not what he originally intended to thank him for. 

He wants to take it back later when he sees Seiji holding back a laugh at the accidental stripe of gray down Natori’s cheek, which appeared after Natori reached up to take off his glasses, forgetting his own dirty hands.

 

.66.

The circle sizzles, the blossoming eye in its center condensing the characters curled around its borders into a single pillar of light. 

Natori’s voice crescendos up to the last syllable, and the pillar expands, ground rumbling beneath the strain.

Something whizzes past Natori’s head to hit the heart of the circle. 

The light collapses instantly.

Nothing is left of the circle, except for the smoky indents in the dirt and the arrow embedded in the center with paper trailing from its end, marked with the characters for _break_. 

“Not quick enough,” Seiji says, bending to one knee to pull the arrow from the ground. 

Natori swallows. “I didn’t think Matoba Seiji would be talented at hide-and-seek.” 

Seiji stands, inspects the arrow’s tip before tucking it into his pack. “Is this all this is to you? A child’s game?”

“What was wrong this time?” Natori snaps. “The charm and the chant were both correct.”

“You have three minutes,” Seiji says, “to run to anywhere in this field and complete the seal before I set out to find you. How much time, Shuuichi-san, do you think a yokai would give you?” 

“Would you like a turn, then?” Natori says, concentrating on keeping his breaths even. His wrists ache a little from the harsh pace he’s put them through, circles and charms drawn rapid-fire in succession in the last hour. 

It’s been the second day since this type of practice started. The sealing chant is twice as long as the ones he’s learned before. Even though Natori already knows so much more than he did half a year ago, he’s struggling. 

It’s still not enough. Seiji is good at reminding him of that.

“A turn?” Seiji repeats, his gaze distant. “For practicing this? I have had enough.” 

Seiji is strong. Natori knows this. 

Everyone knows this. 

_Did you hear? The Matoba heir already successfully performed his fifth sealing. He is lucky his blood is strong._

_He is strong yes. But even one as strong as he cannot lift the curse attached to his name._

Involuntarily, Natori’s mind recalls the whispers from the last gathering and his anger rushes out, like a candle dropped into water. 

“Seiji,” Natori says, stepping towards him. He reaches his hand out, a little hesitatingly, towards Seiji’s shoulder.

Seiji’s hand rises and Natori freezes, wondering if Seiji will push his hand away, step back from him.

He doesn’t.

Seiji raises his hand to pull Natori’s own into his grasp. “Come here,” Seiji says and Natori follows, careful to keep from stumbling over the uneven dips and holes in the field. 

From the back, Seiji’s hair is longer, dipping lower into the curve where his collar borders his shoulders. The line is just a little uneven, a small difference from the careful manners of the Seiji he usually sees, and Natori wants to draw his fingers along it, fix it like a smudged stroke on a charm. 

He wants to, but Seiji-- 

Is still holding his hand, Natori realizes, is aware of the firm grip of fingertips on his own, the sleeve of Seiji’s black jacket pressed on his own bare wrist. 

Natori is used to close contact with Seiji. Seiji’s shoulder bumping his as he looks over Natori’s circles, a hand adjusting the curve of Natori’s wrist for a seal, their heads bent close enough to brush as they sit for a break and Natori breathes in, in, in, readying himself for the next session of recitations. 

He’s used to it, but this is unfamiliar.

Natori’s glasses almost slip when they stop by a cluster of trees, and he brings up his other hand to stop their descent. 

“Listen,” Seiji says, turns back to look at Natori. 

He brings up Natori’s hand to rest on in the space just below his collarbones, on the shirt beneath his open jacket. 

Seiji releases his hand from Natori’s. “I’ll do the chant. If you can feel me breathe properly, you will be better prepared for another try.” 

He does, once, twice. 

Natori hears the words in a smooth stream, divides them with the thump of Seiji’s heartbeats. 

“Do you have it?” Seiji says. 

“Yes,” Natori says, “Yes. I’ll just--” and he drops his hand away, notices the outline of his palm on Seiji’s shirt. 

“Repeat it,” Seiji says. 

Natori opens his mouth, and the syllables flee from his eyes, leave him grasping for words. 

“Shuuichi-san,” Seiji says, leans in to look at him. “Are you well?”

“You’re,” Natori says, “looking at me,” and there’s frustration there. Natori doesn’t know _why_. 

Seiji is still there, lips pressed in a downward line, as he always does when thinking. His eyes shift from Natori’s eyes to the lizard clambering from Natori’s cheek to the underside of his jaw. 

Just as Seiji brings his head up, Natori tips his chin down, intending to apologize, perhaps, to say he was ready try the chant again.

“Matoba-sama!”

Seiji stops moving. Another half-angle higher, their faces would be, _they would be-_

“Matoba-sama!”

Natori opens his mouth, says, “Someone’s calling you.” 

Seiji has a look Natori doesn’t recognize. 

He steps back. Natori doesn’t move from his position.

In the distance, Natori spots two men in nondescript robes stepping sharply through the grass. Behind them, a sleek black vehicle is parked where the road stops at the field. 

When Seiji walks away to his clan servants, Natori can only watch until he becomes just a dark speck fading into the horizon. 

“I’ll practice again tomorrow,” Natori says, brings up a hand to cover his mouth, as if he wants to pull the words back in.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> **lady_peony** : i want to punch these two and then have them punch each other (with their _mouths_ ). thanks to co-captain copperiisulfate for helping me cry about THESE TWO and making them cry more. 
> 
> **copperiisulfate** : so lady_peony came up with the glorious idea to co-write some chapters. this two-parter wound up being the end result, and was also THE MOST FUN to write :) thanks for being such a flawless copilot!


	10. choukei: part 2

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Seiji had always known that there was a cost to ascension, to power. 
> 
> He had never expected this to be a problem, but then, he had not expected a great number of things.

 

.77.

“If I had but one last breath, I will say this.” Natori draws back his shoulders, lets the line blossom full and clear from his throat. “I love you.”   
  
The words hang suspended in the air, resting on the gravity in Natori’s voice, the dusk light tracing gold rings in his eyes.  
  
A laugh slips out of Matoba’s mouth into the air, a silvery burst of amusement. “And what brought on this confession?”  
  
“Seiji!” Shuuichi says, whips his head around to face Matoba, almost dropping the papers in his hand. “That wasn’t for you to hear!”   
  
“Oh? It wasn’t?”  
  
“As a matter of fact,” Shuuichi says, mustering up an expression of dignified patience, “it’s for a play for the school festival. Snow White, this year.”   
  
“You’re the prince,” Matoba says, unsurprised.

Over the months, Shuuichi’s previous restlessness had eased into a steadier sort of grace. Unlike his prior default expression of distant civility, recently, Shuuichi has been more apt to smiling. This change only served to further heighten Shuuichi’s looks, which were hardly unappealing to begin with.   
  
“You can laugh,” Shuuichi says, rueful. “It  _is_  my last year and the class insisted on it. Suwabe-san especially.”   
  
“This Suwabe-san asked you,” Matoba says, “to be the prince.”   
  
“Her father used to be an actor, and her mother is some big-name agent.” Shuuichi shrugs. “She takes drama very seriously. As I was the tallest boy in class, she thought I was the natural choice for prince.”  
  
“Did she?” Matoba subtly tries to skim the rest of the upside-down script by Shuuichi’s knee. “Do you kiss? At the end?”  
  
Shuuichi fixes him with a familiar look, similar to the expression he always gives to a particularly tricky spell.   
  
“It’s a play,” Shuuichi says, shoving the script back into his bag.   
  
That doesn’t answer Matoba’s question at all.   
  
He pushes it to the side however, when Shuuichi brings out the glasses. Defensive circles took significant time to master and Matoba didn’t plan to waste any more time today.

 

 

.97.  
  
Shuuichi’s fingertips are turning red. Even in the spring, the evening chill is strong enough to bite.  
  
“Once more,” Matoba says, watches a puff of steam escape from Shuuichi’s lips into the air.   
  
Shuuichi’s movements are perfect, all swift grace and smooth transitions. Light crackles from the paper, reflecting off his glasses, his determined frown.  
  
As the light dissipates, Shuuichi turns to Matoba, smiles with an irrepressibly triumphant edge.   
  
“I said I would get it.”  
  
“On the third try,” Matoba adds, raising his hands to adjust the scarf around his neck. “But it was well done.”  
  
Shuuichi yawns once, covers his mouth with the back of his hand. “There was one more technique I needed to run through, wasn’t there?”  
  
“Not today,” Matoba says. He flashes his gaze upwards when he hears a rustling noise, relaxes a little when he sees the resting shape of an owl.   
  
Shuuichi takes off his glasses and slowly flexes the fingers of his left hand. “I can’t come here. Tomorrow, that is.”   
  
“Why?” Matoba says. The tail end of the word rises upwards into something demanding. Almost childish.   
  
Shuuichi tucks his glasses into his right pocket, raises his head to look at him.   
  
Matoba does not think of himself as well-versed in interpreting emotions. It takes him a minute longer before he can attach a name to that look, supposes that it must be regret.   
  
Two years is barely enough time to know someone. Shuuichi, as always, proves an exception, or perhaps, Matoba could chalk it up to his own learning curve.   
  
“Where are you going?” Matoba says, impatient with the silence.   
  
“Nowhere,” Shuuichi says. “Not tomorrow. It’s only my graduation plan meeting with the head teacher.”   
  
For a moment, Matoba feels like he’s had a drink of something scalding, the surprise at the sensation pinning down his tongue.   
  
“And after,” he says, finally, with absolute calm, “where are you going, Shuuichi?”  
  
“If it’s that important,” Shuuichi says, with a laugh that sounds forced, “I know for certain you would be able to find out. I’m not going to university though.”  
  
Of course, Matoba could. Of course it’s important to know, if only so he could keep an eye on a powerful ally, or at least, a useful one.  
  
“I’ll be busy with work,” Shuuichi goes on, hands dropping down to shuffle around the inside of the bag by his hip. He seems to be deliberately avoiding Matoba’s eyes. “And you’ll have your family duties.”   
  
“Don’t you have yours, as well?” Matoba says, and when he sees Shuuichi freeze for a brief second, feels a dark flicker of satisfaction.  
  
“Did you have to--?” Shuuichi starts, and bites back the rest of the question.  
  
It was the truth.  
  
Shuuichi hasn’t learned enough, still has much farther to go to become strong enough to pull together the fragmented pride of the Natori clan. Shuuichi had been accomplishing it slowly, sealing after sealing, assignment after assignment, even if it was merely a side effect of his wish to protect others from ayakashi.  
  
There were still years upon years of lore that even Matoba himself needed to learn before he could even consider being counted among the most skilled exorcists. Shuuichi needed to learn much, much more if he wanted to be a strong one.   
  
Shuuichi finally lifts his hands from the bag, zips it closed with a decisive motion. “We won’t be able to meet like this anymore after graduation. And you wouldn’t need to speak with me, unless there’s an emergency assignment.”  
  
“A break from watching you fumbling through seals and mispronouncing spells,” Matoba says, bringing out his most pleasant smile. “It’ll be a change of scenery.”   
  
Shuuichi’s fingers uncurl from his palm to reach forward, then change direction halfway to drop down and brush against the scarf looped around Matoba’s neck.   
  
“Remember to bring that back,” Shuuichi says, and adds, soft enough that Matoba has to strain to hear. “You have one month left.”   
  
When Natori gets his scarf back later, the day before he boards the train, he doesn’t see the extra slip of paper tucked into it with a scribbled number.   
  
At least, he doesn’t see it until he reaches the city and sinks into the bed, exhausted. The paper drifts into his lap once he unrolls the scarf, intending to wear it in the chilled, too-artificial air of the hotel room.   
  
His scarf still retains the scent of greenery and a familiar tea which Natori never drinks.   
  
The next morning, Natori picks up the paper, slips it in the inside pocket of his bag. He doesn’t allow himself to remove the paper from its spot after he finally reaches his apartment, and drops his bag in the farthest corner of the empty storage closet. 

 

  
.97.

_Shuuichi,_  
  
_This season has been unexpectedly damp; the white camellias at my window are thriving well. However, the ground conditions for drawing circles are less than ideal. Regardless of the weather, I still managed to banish two yokai today with nothing more than a single circle._  
  
_How long has it been since you have drawn the eight basic circles? It would have been a waste of all my time if you neglect your drills. I promise to disinvite you from the next meeting if you forget to do them._

 

*

  
_Shuuichi,_  
  
_Perhaps it was for the best that you have not reached me now. Surely, your work must be keeping you occupied, as has mine. I have been told by my corporate advisors that my last company proposal was merely “satisfactory for its purpose.”_  
  
_Would it have been easier, I wonder, if you had proposed it to them? In part, your craft does involve a layer of self-aware deceit. Still, I know you are not one to give out words that you do not mean, that you do not mean to keep. In the arena of persuasion, you may very well outmatch me._  
  
_I caught a glimpse of you on screen today, when we were idling at a light. If you must play a dashing folk hero, the least they could have done was given you a proper archery instructor. I suspect it doesn’t matter much, not with all the close-ups on your face._

 

*

  
_Shuuichi,_  
  
_This evening’s tea had been brewed too strongly. In the subsequent time after dinner, I have already reviewed three new spells, reread a scroll on distinguishing marks between beast-shaped yokai and common forest creatures, and practiced drawing fifty warding charms from memory._  
  
_Once I had finished all of this, I found that the light from the window was still not dark enough to prevent me from writing. It would also be a shame to put this freshly ground ink to waste._  
  
_I would prefer to go to bed earlier but, as matters stand, it seems I have little choice. ~~On the other hand, you always did have the tendency to nap at inopportune times~~_

  
  
_*_

 

_Shuuichi,_

_I had another another assignment today. This one was deemed rather difficult, even for the experienced exorcists, so they came to me._  
  
_It is always the yokai who look the most human who are the most dangerous._  
  
_Trapping it was easy. And yet, it was rumored to be too strong to be killed. Too strong even, to be banished._  
  
_It was only once I had gone up the stairs and it turned around, that I knew why._  
  
_~~It looked like you.~~ _  
  
_I banished it, successfully. Did you expect anything less?_  
  
_It took two arrows to the heart before it was finished._

 

*

  
_Shuuichi,_  
  
_Your clan is doing as well as it can be expected. A few of the elderly exorcists have said as much over their cups. The Natori name has not dropped entirely from the tongues of all our exorcist circles, probably thanks to your deeds of the past two years. However, your absence from the last three meetings has not gone unnoticed._  
  
_If you keep away for much longer, I fear you may find far too few assignments open to you upon your return._  
  
_You may be pleased to know that Takuma-san asked after you today. He looked surprised when I said I did not know._  
  
_~~Did you not receive my paper? Is there truly nothing else left that you wish to ask me?~~_  
  
Matoba frowns as the line thins into a faded streak. He sets the brush down to the side, lifts the paper to join the pile on the right side of the desk.   
  
The faces of the envelopes on his left are all bare as the crooked branches at his window, white surfaces without the faintest stamp of an address or name.   
  
Matoba examines his palms for a moment, and slowly folds up the paper in front of him to place in a box by his side. Half of the box is already full.  
  
He rises to place the box on the highest shelf he can reach, sets it between a manual on seasonal winter flowers and a stack of blank scrolls.  
  
He looks back only once before he leaves the room, counts this as a victory. 

 

  
.97.  
  
Natori is in a lobby waiting, skimming once again over the letter. It’s the third time he’s read it and now, he turns to the television screen mounted on the wall, for change of scenery more than anything.   
  
He’d barely paid it any attention except he registers that it’s time for the national news and there’s a banner scrolling by. There’s a throwaway mention of the Matoba corporation and some rumoured injury befalling the young corporate heir.   
  
“The normally reclusive family’s media representative has assured the press that it was no more than a minor household accident,” says the newscaster, “and that there should be no interruptions to the daily affairs of the corporation as a result.”   
  
That is all that is said on the matter before they shift gears to the stock market.   
  
Natori isn’t exactly sure how he finds himself at the train station.  
  
He doesn’t actually remember leaving the agency building or taking the taxi that got him there, the letter of welcome from his new agent entirely forgotten.  
  
It’s all a bit of a blur, accompanied by a persistent ringing in his ears.   
  
He can’t imagine exactly what a ‘minor household accident’ even translates to in Matoba clan terms. Natori feels suddenly, violently ill and knows it has nothing to do with the train’s jerky movements.   
  
He searches every corner and pocket of his bag, fiercely hopes that he finds that scrap of paper Seiji had slipped into his scarf when he’d first left. When he dials the number on it, it’s nothing but a dead line.   
  
_I shouldn’t have left you_ , he thinks, as he dials for the second time and the third. No answer, again.   
  
He crumples up the paper and shoves it back in his bag, presses his palms against his eyes so hard he sees stars.   
  
_I shouldn’t have left you. I shouldn’t have_ \--

  
*

  
Hours later, he finds himself in front of Seiji’s doorstep.   
  
It’s well past midnight and he doesn’t think anyone is going to let him in at this hour, if they would have even bothered to let him in at all.   
  
Fortunately, he remembers which window is Seiji’s. 

  
*

  
“What the  _hell_ ,” Seiji hisses, “are you doing here?”  
  
Natori exhales at the sight of him, a breath he has been holding since the agency. He can't help when he says, a bit scathing, “Good to see you too,” but his voice comes out all strangled.  
  
And then he sees it.  
  
“What’s that on your face?”  
  
“It’s almost two in the morning,” Seiji ignores his question. “You were supposed to be in the city.”   
  
“I was,” Natori says, numb. “ _What is that_  on your face?” He almost reaches for the strip of paper covering Seiji’s right eye but Seiji grabs his wrist.   
  
It’s only here Natori realizes that his own hands are shaking.   
  
“I heard you were hurt,” Natori says, thinks he feels some of his earlier dizziness still.   
  
Seiji laughs, and it’s a cold, harsh sound. It is nothing at all like his light, airy laughter that Natori had grown used to, even fond of, as he would laugh at Natori’s abject clumsiness and all of Natori’s frustration and embarrassment during their lessons. All of that seems like another lifetime ago.   
  
Now, Seiji’s laughter chills Natori to the bone.   
  
“You need to leave, Natori.”  
  
_Natori. Not Shuuichi-san_. Something has happened here, Natori realizes. Already, something has changed.   
  
“Not until you tell me what happened.” And Natori knows, does not know how but  _he knows_  that he cannot leave now, that if he leaves now, _everything_  will be lost.   
  
“How about,” Seiji says, in that same hollow voice that he’s had ever since Natori stepped into his room, “I show you instead.”  
  
He lifts the strip of paper and Natori wants to close his eyes, tear them away from the sight of the wound before him, fresh and red and angry. It makes Natori wants to scream, enraged, in the face of the  _sheer unfairness of it all_ , and in hopes that it might wake him from this thing that is feeling increasingly like a horrid fever dream.   
  
He makes himself look at it instead and commit it to his memory.  
  
Of course, he had heard of the Matoba clan’s curse. The exorcist community is small. It would have been near impossible not to. At his age, Seiji was already surpassing some of the most powerful exorcists of the generation before, and yet, this was a legacy that no amount of talent or quick wit could protect him from.   
  
“ _Now_ , will you leave?” Seiji asks of him again, voice nearly cracking on the last word, when Natori has done nothing but stare in silence. It’s difficult to remember how to move or do a great number of things.   
  
“No,” says Natori, and there’s an edge to his own voice he hadn’t expected. “You were supposed to be-- _you weren’t_ \--I should never have left,” he manages to spit out at last.   
  
Seiji laughs but this time it is a dull, weary sound. “Right,” he says, “because that would have definitely made such a difference in the turn of events.”   
  
It is brutally condescending but that is the least of Natori’s concerns right now. It is also probably true, he tells himself.   
  
“Look, Shuuichi,” Seiji sighs, and Natori hates himself for the smallest ripple of relief at hearing Seiji call him by his given name again. “It’s a kind thought you have, but in the grand scheme of things, even my ancestors, who were some of the most powerful exorcists, could not fight this thing off. And now, I am going to say it one last time. You need to leave.”  
  
Natori shakes his head, “I’m going to say it for the last time as well.  _No_.”  
  
“Very well,” Seiji says, exhausted. “There is a spare futon in the closet. Forgive me for not being at my most hospitable tonight.”  
  
Natori heads towards the closet and sets up his futon next to Seiji’s.  
  
They spend the remainder of the night in silence. 

 

 

  
.97.   
  
The next morning in the Matoba house is eventful, to say the least.   
  
During breakfast, all eyes are on Natori, who resolutely continues to pretend that they aren’t, and if Seiji has any discomfort about this, he doesn’t show it. Rather, the stare of his uninjured eye almost dares them to say a word.   
  
Whatever they may be thinking about a Natori practically glued to the side of their clan heir, they don’t utter a breath about it in his company.  
  
It would have been a little entertaining had the circumstances that brought Natori here hadn’t kept his mind otherwise occupied. 

*

  
When they are alone again in Seiji’s room, he closes his eyes, exhales. He tries to not think of the stinging that is still at its worst over the crease of his eyelid or of the way that everyone,  _everyone_  is whispering around him, only to stop shock-still as soon as he walks into a room.  
  
Finally, he tries not to think about Shuuichi, who is, by mere association with Seiji, exposing himself to more danger than he knows.   
  
Seiji of course has no success with any of it, but especially that last one, not when Shuuichi has hardly let him out of his sight, not when Shuuichi’s hand has somehow inexplicably found his, the clasp of it warm and  _here_  and they don’t talk about it. Seiji does not really mind that they don’t talk about it if it means that he can keep it here.   
  
_No_ , he thinks.  _No_ \--  
  
"You need to leave,” he says. It’s that same old refrain from the previous night but he hopes that now it might make a difference.   
  
He is better; he is  _fine_. It was just that it had been the  _first time_. It was all a matter of time anyway, all about biding time until the inevitable. He has known this for as long as he has known himself to be a Matoba. There is a small swell of pride even.   
  
Clearly, this means that he is growing stronger, on his way to becoming what he was meant to be all along. In many ways, the confirmation is reassuring.   
  
He is in his own home, surrounded and protected by ancient wards and old power. There is nowhere that he would be safer and stronger.  _As for Shuuichi, however_ \--   
  
Every time he closes his eyes, he can see the blood. In the better moments, it is only his own. In others, well. He tries to shake the thought away.  _Again_.   
  
When he turns, it’s to find Shuuichi staring at him openly, only to catch himself before looking away. Shuuichi runs a thumb over the pulse point by his wrist, barely a graze of a touch but it may as well be imprinted into Seiji’s skin, enough to make him shiver if he’s not careful.   
  
"I wish you'd talk about it," Shuuichi says, exasperation mixed with concern. "I wish--” and he sighs. "I know you need your space so I won’t impose any longer but--” He looks as if he wants to say something else but seems to decide against it. “I’ll be--around, if you need anything, not that I expect you'll be smart enough to ask." 

  
*

  
It's not like Natori brought much with him to Seiji's in his midnight escapade but he still takes his time and finds himself dallying on his way out.  
  
If Seiji seems equal parts annoyed and amused at Natori's hovering, he doesn’t say much about it. The upside to it is that it seems to have momentarily distracted him from the fact that there's an ayakashi after his eye. It helps Natori not feel too guilty about the fact.   
  
Then there’s the fact that, for all of Seiji's growing irritation, he has still got a vice-like grip on Natori's hand. And still, neither of them has felt the need to address it.  
  
Natori doesn't know what to say when he's almost out the door. He doesn't want to leave Seiji alone even though they both know Seiji is right. There is nothing, no extra level of protection, that Natori could provide in the face of something that generations of skilled exorcists could not overcome.  
  
What's worse is that he now finds himself terrified of losing the point of contact because Seiji's hand in his is a touchstone, a reminder that he's here and safe and alive, or as safe as can be given who he is. Natori doesn't like to think about that last bit but this is his life now and Seiji is a part of it, regardless of how either of them had thought it would be.  
  
Despite Seiji's grand show of irritation, he doesn't seem all that pleased to stand at the doorstep either as Natori prepares to leave. He keeps tugging at loose threads on Natori's sleeve and fixing his shirt collar, fussing with him and frowning, as he tells Natori that  _he_  looks like the one who got attacked by a yokai instead.   
  
Something about this warms Natori and he surprises himself with a laugh, likely the first genuine one between the two of them since he got here.   
  
"Yeah, well," Natori says, not really knowing where he's going with that. He knows that he is absently tugging at one of the strings dangling by the hood of Matoba's favourite sweater, the one that Natori had always joked made him look like a normal person rather than an ominous clan heir.   
  
Natori winds up tugging a little harder than he meant to, accidentally catching some fabric in the process, and Seiji isn't balanced quite right because he comes stumbling suddenly into Natori's space. Seiji braces himself with a hand on Natori's shoulder and their foreheads bump lightly, making Seiji laugh.  
  
Neither makes a move to step away immediately and it's only when Natori finds his hand drifting from Seiji's sweater to the nape of his neck that he catches himself. It's here that Seiji seems to straighten himself out as well.  
  
"Be careful," Natori says, clearing his throat before he turns away. 

  
*

  
They don’t see as much of each other after that. Occasionally, Matoba will send Shuuichi a note or two, telling him about his miscellaneous going-ons and small reminders to practice this or that technique. He also manages to skillfully evade all of Shuuichi’s attempts to check up on him.   
  
Of course, for every action there is an equal and opposite reaction, and so, Shuuichi’s replies also become sparser and increasingly curt as the days go by.   
  
He knows that Shuuichi is upset with him, knows that he deserves it for shutting him out of his life so adamantly after they were becoming something akin to friends. Or maybe they were already there. It was hard to know when he didn’t have much of a comparison point.   
  
Regardless, he tells himself, this is the way the world works.   
  
He tells himself that it will only be for a short period of time, that once everything has stabilized, within the clan and within his own head, they could and would go back to their carefree days. They would meet in the woods, where he would once laugh at the leaves that blew into Shuuichi’s hair, leaves that Shuuichi had finally allowed him to remove without flinching at his touch.   
  
Matoba had called him out on it once, laughing, had said, “You’ve made some progress, haven’t you? You don’t lash out like a cornered cat anymore.”   
  
Shuuichi had just rolled his eyes at that, refused to acknowledge it entirely, and gone on to ask about the next step in the banishment.   
  
It is tremendously easy to be nostalgic about anything and everything, Matoba discovers, when all you have are the memories and even those seem to be slipping, like you’d dreamt them up after all.   
  
Weeks go by and when he does attempt to reach out to Shuuichi again, in quiet, subtle terms, ask him how he has been faring and if he would like to meet, to practice, to review, the replies are no more than a few words. Mostly, what he gets goes along the lines of: “busy,” or “out of town,” or “at an audition.” There is hardly much elaboration beyond that.  
  
Figures, thinks Matoba, tries to swallow down the bitter taste of it. He knows that he has done this to himself.   
  
(He still wakes up, sometimes, shaking after dreams where there’s blood splattered as far as he can see, blood that’s not his own.)  
  
Then again, he decides, it was probably for the best.

 

 

  
.110.  
  
The next time they meet is at an exorcists’ gathering and Shuuichi only graces him with a nod and the briefest eye contact before sitting on the opposite end of the room.  
  
Matoba can’t really bring himself to concentrate through most of it, finds himself too distracted by the yokai tattoo that circles around Shuuichi’s neck and then burrows below his collar. It reappears by his sleeve and settles at his wrist, and Seiji finds himself almost envying the damned thing.  
  
He’s upset with himself for this sudden and inexplicable ache to touch him, be near him, to even just  _speak to him_. It feels like it could very well be consuming him whole, burning him from the inside out.   
  
At the end of the meeting, he cannot help himself. He grabs the hem of Shuuichi’s sleeve, manages to say his name and not much else for fear of losing himself entirely.   
  
He feels unable to move under the full weight of Shuuichi’s attention on him when he finally has it. His head goes blank and his throat is dry and tight. All he can think about is how much he’s missed him, how much he misses him  _constantly_.   
  
“It’s been a while Matoba,” Shuuichi nods once. “I hope you have been well.”  
  
And the sound of his family name in Shuuichi’s mouth  _stings_  like it was perhaps meant to.   
  
“ _Don’t_ \--” hisses Matoba, and then stops himself. “Look,” he starts again, not knowing how to work his tongue around the words. “I have been thinking--”  
  
“I’m sorry,” says Shuuichi. “I have somewhere to be. I’m sure we will see each other around. You certainly look well from when I saw you last. I’m glad.”   
  
Matoba lets him go but there is no mistaking that Shuuichi is wearing his actor face and his actor smile. It is so grating and so  _wrong_  that it makes Matoba half want to blow this room apart.  
  
It’s when he is making his own way out that he overhears some hushed whispers behind his back.   
  
They’re talking about his eye, of course. He’s got it covered now so it’s hardly inconspicuous and hardly surprising that they would. He doesn’t think much of it and nearly ignores it except, he then catches the Natori name mentioned immediately after.   
  
“He borrowed some scrolls, prized antiques,” an old exorcist whispers. “He had said it was for research. I had thought it suspicious but he told me to name a price and that he would double it.”   
  
Matoba turns around, interjects himself into the conversation without warning, “What kind of scrolls?”   
  
The man nearly jumps before he shifts his attention to Matoba and bows once. “Ah, if it isn’t Matoba-sama. In fact, I had thought you might have sent him but it still didn’t add up. I assumed the Matoba house would hardly need copies of the old records, not when you possess the originals.”  
  
“ _What kind?_ ” Seiji repeats, nearly through his teeth.  
  
“Well, you see, they were records of yokai curses passed down through lineage, as well as materials on exorcist genealogy. Specifically, yours.”   
  
Seiji feels his blood go cold.  
  
_Did I teach you nothing_ , he thinks,  _about protecting yourself?_  
  
He gets himself out of there before the room spins any faster than it already is.

 

*

  
_Shuuichi,_  
  
_We need to talk. It’s urgent._    
  
If this is the last note he ever sends Shuuichi, so be it.   
  
If this is the last time he allows himself to see Shuuichi, so be it, so long as he is left knowing that Shuuichi will be safe and alive and  _away_. 

 

 

  
.111.  
  
“What were you thinking?” Seiji snarls, as soon as catches sight of Shuuichi in their old field, before Shuuichi can barely open his mouth. “ _Were_  you even thinking? And don’t you  _dare_  insult me by acting like you don’t know what I’m talking about.”  
  
“So you found out.” Shuuichi shakes his head. His laugh is humorless. “I was hoping to surprise you when I actually got somewhere with it.”   
  
“You are out of your mind,” Seiji says, trying so hard to keep his voice level. “And what exactly did you want to surprise me with? Your corpse?”  
  
“I am trying to help you,” Shuuichi snaps.   
  
“And I’m trying to help  _you_ , first and foremost by keeping you safe!”  
  
“All you’ve ever done is protect me,” Shuuichi says. “Time and time again. Why am I not allowed to repay you?”  
  
Seiji thinks his best option right now would be to wound him irreparably, to say the truth that they both know and neither wants to voice: _You’re not strong enough. You might never be strong enough_. It would do the trick, he thinks. It might make Shuuichi hate him just enough to leave, to never return.   
  
He doesn’t know what stops him. Maybe it is the thought of that boy by his window, the boy at his door, who slept beside him in his darker hours, who held on to his hand and swore to not leave. That boy was braver, stronger, in so many other ways that it would be, more than anything, a lie to tell him otherwise.   
  
Seiji has never had trouble with lies, especially when they are the means to an end which will justify them later. Shuuichi’s safety will justify any and every lie Seiji will ever tell.   
  
And yet--Seiji thinks that, after everything, this is something he owes Shuuichi.  
  
“It’s not about repayment,” Seiji says at last   
  
Shuuichi barks a laugh. “Do you know that I thought of you as a friend? I hadn’t meant to, not in the beginning. I didn’t even know what that was like. I’d thought at first, so one of the strongest exorcists is offering to share his knowledge with me, why not? I’ll take it and become stronger, use it to protect people. Then somewhere along the way, you began to matter. What good am I if I can’t even protect that?”  
  
“And somewhere along the way,” Seiji laughs, and it’s a little unsteady, “you began to matter far too much.”   
  
Shuuichi looks at him, says nothing but swallows perceptibly.The ayakashi previously settled on his cheek dives behind his neck.   
  
Seiji takes a deep breath. “Would you believe me if I told you that I can handle it? As horrific as this may seem, it comes with the territory. Leverage is quintessential in our line of work, and as a Matoba, I was taught from an early age what that meant, what to expect.” Shuuichi remains silent, even as Seiji watches his face pale with every word. “I am protected by this,” Seiji finishes, by way of explanation. “Others are not.”   
  
“But you taught me,” Shuuichi insists. “Surely, I could--”  
  
“ _Maybe_ ,” Seiji interrupts him, “but the fact of the matter is that we both dealt with this badly. It was my fault for driving you to doing what you did. You meant well, but I didn’t want your help. I had, however, forgotten how stubborn you could be.”   
  
If that last bit comes out a little fond, then he can’t quite help it. Shuuichi is a force to be reckoned with after all. So much of it had nothing to do with what Seiji had taught him and everything to do with who Shuuichi was, plain and simple. It had been foolish and ignorant of Seiji to have ever forgotten that, to have expected any less of him.   
  
“I suppose,” Seiji says, “the more important question is: would you believe me if I told you that I would ask for your help if I couldn’t handle it?”  
  
“No,” says Shuuichi, without hesitation. “Because you wouldn’t.”  
  
Seiji smiles, a sharpness to it. He is, in all honesty, a little surprised by how well Shuuichi has come to know him. “No,” he says. “You’re right. I wouldn’t have before but I would now. Still, you must understand: I could not just stand by and watch you endanger yourself for my sake.”   
  
“So tell me,” Shuuichi says, voice level, “how are we going to deal with it differently now?” The ayakashi on his skin settles on his collar, stills, as if waiting for Seiji’s answer as well.   
  
It’s not just that he is a Matoba, but also because he is who he is, who he has been, which is always steady, with a clear path for himself in mind, unwilling to compromise, that makes the answer difficult.   
  
And yet, if anything is worth the compromise, he knows it is this.   
  
“How about together?”   
  
Shuuichi smiles the smallest of smiles. It is definitely his own and not his media persona’s smile. It also makes Seiji's heart leap just a little. Shuuichi steps over the grass and closer to Seiji, gives an experimental tug to the string by the hood of Seiji’s favourite sweater, as if ringing a bell. “Deal?”   
  
Seiji has to bite back a laugh for fear that it will give way to the emotion that’s been caught in his throat. “Deal.” 

 

 

.214.  
  
He’s seated on the floor by the window, annotating an old text on sealings, when Shuuichi finds him. He looks up and Shuuichi seems a little flustered. His hair is in disarray and small clouds of dust are stuck to his shoulders.   
  
“If you're here to reprimand me for taking a break from cleaning,” Seiji starts, but then stops almost immediately when Shuuichi drops a cardboard box right in front of him.  
  
Seiji blinks. He's trying to fill in whatever gap is missing here. He has come to read Shuuichi well over the years but there are still moments where it's something of a challenge.   
  
“Open it,” he says, and either Seiji is imagining it or his voice sounds a little strange.   
  
Seiji does.  
  
“Ah,” he says, trying to suppress a laugh. He had forgotten where he had put those. “So you found them.”   
  
“Was I not supposed to?” Shuuichi actually sounds something akin to self-conscious at this.  
  
Seiji chuckles. “Five years ago, maybe not. Now, I suppose it hardly matters.” He looks at Shuuichi, who is busying himself picking dust and lint off his shirt, as if trying to keep his hands occupied for the sake of it. “Did you read them?”   
  
Shuuichi sighs and sits across from him. “Some,” he says. “I was hoping I could save others to read out loud to embarrass you the next time you decided to aggravate me.”  
  
Seiji cannot help but feel suddenly warmed and so fond. “I look forward to it. As should you. I remember some of them being fairly ridiculous.”  
  
“And surprisingly endearing,” Shuuichi almost groans, as if the fact leaves him personally affronted, “even if you were  _such a handful_. I don't know if you remember. High maintenance baby heir with all your airs and graces.” Shuuichi shakes his head. “Everything out of your mouth was like a backhanded compliment, wrapped up in Heian-era poetry.”   
  
“High maintenance,” Seiji retorts, but can’t keep the grin off his face, “says the boy who bled his way home at least twice a week.”  
  
“ _Well_ ,” counters Shuuichi, with his eyes on the box, “you wound up writing a box full of love letters to that boy so I don't know who came out of it worse for wear.” He's smiling in that absent way of his that he does when he hardly realizes he's doing it. It is quite possibly Seiji's favorite thing.  
  
“I did, didn't I?” Seiji says, and then, softer, “You know, I would do it all over again.”  
  
Shuuichi pushes the box to the side and moves to close the distance between them. He takes Seiji's face in his hands, presses his lips to the spot below his brow where the protective charm begins to fall over his eye, a charm no one other than Shuuichi has ever been allowed to touch. He drifts to do the same against Seiji's right cheek, and finally, settles against his mouth, articulating every syllable carefully when he whispers, “And so would I.”  
  
Seiji often finds some kind of comical irony in that once, he had thought Shuuichi an ill omen, and whatever they were to each other to be tremendously unlucky. No one had been more taken aback than Seiji himself when, in fact, it turned out to be the opposite.   
  
When it comes down to it, he is the reason Seiji can sleep at night. He is all the luck Seiji has and all the luck he will ever need.  
  
It’s when he’s got Shuuichi on his back and they are both too otherwise occupied to catch the soft swish followed by rustling sounds that the box makes as it’s knocked off its side, papers scattering everywhere over the floor.   
  
“Wait-- _wait_ \--!” Shuuichi pulls away, much to Seiji’s dismay, and then turns his head to the side to take in the mess they’ve made. He groans. “ _You_  wrote those! You are going to be cleaning this up!” 

“Of course,” says Seiji, grinning against Shuuichi’s neck. “I’ll take care of it later.”

 

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> **lady_peony** : all of our tears and blood just to churn out like 20 pages of matoba pining _miserably_ for natori like a regency hero. copperiisulfate deserves all the gold stars for like 90% of matoba being ridiculous. 
> 
> **copperiisulfate** : so we established that an alternative title for this story could easily have been "EXTENSIVE LIBERTIES WERE TAKEN!" (subtitled: profusely apologizing to midorikawa yuki forever), but really, what a wild ride! lady_peony deserves all the gold stars for putting up with my chaotic everything, consistently having excellent ideas, and being a wonderful sport!
> 
> special thanks to jan for sharing some excellent [insights](http://epiphenomenal.tumblr.com/post/112508925842) about recent manga translations involving the matoba clan and its relationship with the eye-stealing yokai. 
> 
> the numbers before each section signify the number of notes natori received thus far.
> 
> ETA: the most beautiful people have also done the most beautiful fic art for our humble fic THANK YOU SO MUCH. 
> 
> [“Never needed to use a vending machine? Watch.”](http://izumisays.tumblr.com/post/112806524433/fine-natori-says-under-his-breath-never) by [izumisays](http://izumisays.tumblr.com/)
> 
> [Whatever they may be thinking about a Natori practically glued to the side of their clan heir, they don’t utter a breath about it in his company.](http://izumisays.tumblr.com/post/113203503113/whatever-they-may-be-thinking-about-a-natori) by [izumisays](http://izumisays.tumblr.com/)
> 
> [choukei part 1 art](http://epiphenomenal.tumblr.com/post/113230296542) by [epiphenomenal](http://epiphenomenal.tumblr.com/)


	11. wind chimes

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> A gauntlet is thrown.

As he slides shut the door of his room, Seiji tips his head towards the lattice of afternoon light on the floor, studies his shadow paused between the squares. 

"If one such as he is allowed so many liberties," a familiar voice echoes on his right, "he may as well be counted as one of the house." 

Seiji laughs, the sound dismissive and light. "He would refuse. Keeping his name suits him for his work."

Shuuichi's self-sufficiency is admirable on occasion, more trying during others. 

Like today, for instance. Shuuichi had turned up an entire day late to a scheduled meeting, yawning something about a new assistant and a ticket mix-up. Under his hand, Shuuichi had been swaying like a _furin_ bell in the breeze, like he would drop if Seiji had let go.

He _would_ insist on returning to his family house to rest, until Seiji managed to convince him otherwise. From anyone else, that pride would almost be irritating. Seiji would offer some help, some small favor, and Shuuichi would turn him down reflexively. I can't depend on you to hand-hold me through everything, he would say, with an easy grin. 

Nanase-san has not yet spoken in reply, eyes directed somewhere past his shoulder with a considering light. Seiji steps to the left, reaches out his hand to open the window, more on a whim than anything else.

There is nothing in view outside but thickly-clumped rushes hugging smooth water, all set in vibrant green. An uninvited breeze sweeps in, tugs Seiji's ponytail from his shoulder to swing down his back. 

"No matter how calm the pond," she says behind his elbow, eyes fixed now on the landscape, "it moves easily at the lightest touch of wind."

"The gardens will look well this summer," Seiji says, watches the patternless rustle of _igusa_ grass outside. He stares for a few seconds more before bringing up a hand to close the window. 

"Take more care, Matoba-sama," Nanase-san says, as her hem whispers against the floor down the hall past Seiji's still figure. "I suppose tongues will wag, regardless." 

 

*

 

He's sick of hearing voices the next day. 

If he has to untangle another minor dispute or approve another loan of a clan's shiki, he would do something drastic. Exploding paper was a particularly tempting thought. 

Even without exorcist meetings, the Matoba head still had his day-to-day duties. 

As he circles the room from group to group, his gaze periodically returns to the light-haired figure standing in the corner of the room with hands tucked in his pockets, gaze curious behind the rims of his glasses. 

But this time, when Seiji looks over, Shuuichi is not alone. 

"You told me to find him, Master." The rat yokai's voice is a high-pitched chirp, carrying easily to Seiji's ear. It shuffles a step closer to Shuuichi, nose twitching. "I would not mistake someone else for the head that easily."

"How could this be?" the exorcist snaps at his shiki. "It was Matoba-sama I had expressly ordered you to---" 

He stops, suddenly. Bends his head, as if to peer more closely at Shuuichi's face. 

From his vantage point, Seiji can see that the exorcist overshadows Shuuichi by nearly two feet. Dark hair of no particular style. Age, difficult to determine--early thirties, if he had to guess. The back of his right hand bears three dark slashes, raised scars almost hidden by navy sleeves. 

"Young Natori-san, is it?" Seiji is unable to see their expressions from his position. Nevertheless, a ripple of dislike goes down Seiji's back at the tone. "They say you are close to the Matoba head."

Shuuichi smiles, a careless flash of teeth. "As some would say."

The other exorcist steps closer, drops his voice. 

"Close enough, that one might think you belonged in the clan. Or would it be more accurate to say his bed?"

Seiji feels his lips open without making a sound. 

Unlike his voice, the chatter in the room doesn't stop immediately. But in the radius around Shuuichi, the streams of whispers dry to trickles as more and more heads swivel towards his direction. 

Shuuichi laughs. 

"I have been playing a heartbreaker too often of late," he says, flicks his hair back with his right hand. "I've played my role too well, if you claim my looks are enough to turn just anyone's head."

"What else would you have to offer to our clan head?" the other man says, reaches out and mockingly taps Shuuichi's cheek. 

"Cousin," Seiji says, stepping in. "Isao-san." Beneath his sleeve, he flexes his left hand once, fancies he can hear arrows thudding into flesh instead of wood. 

"Matoba-sama," his second cousin says, stepping back to dip his head in a barely passable nod of respect. 

Seiji shifts his gaze. He sees a familiar sharpness in Shuuichi's eyes as his glance flickers between the two of them, likely measuring up the gathering audience behind Seiji as well. 

Someone is always watching Matoba. And now, he supposes, Shuuichi as well. 

"If it is my strength in question," and Shuuichi widens his smile to his commercial best, a twist of sweetness and silken sincerity, "it must be a challenge you seek." 

Shuuichi always did know what to do with an audience.

 

*

 

"What prize, this challenge?" Isao-san tosses out, as the clan members settle into their seats a safe distance from the barrier in the sand. 

"I had heard you required new help," Shuuichi says, voice ringing across the clearing. "I will be yours for a year, as an assistant. The Natori heir, entirely at your beck and call." 

The whispers around Seiji rise to an louder whine. 

He shuts them out. Narrows his eye against the sun and focuses on the grounds in front of him. 

Isao-san is first. 

It begins with the ripping sound of a seal, a haze of unfurling smoke.

Isao-san favors strength over technique, his speech rough and hurried. The air screeches, a hurricane rush of sand and shadows. 

He finishes with five jars. Not an easy number for the allowed time, the whispers murmur. 

Then, Shuuichi's turn. 

Seiji concentrates on keeping his posture easy, hands open on his knees, as Shuuichi fidgets with the glasses on his face, straightens the sleeves of his robes. 

There's the same sharp ripping sound. 

Shuuichi dashes forward. 

A flock of paper moves with him, intent and surging as the adrenaline in his blood, as it is in Seiji's. 

Seiji knows the movement of those hands, the words unrolling off Shuuichi's tongue, as he had watched him do so practice after practice.

There are half-recognized shapes shifting in the dust and the light, filmy and odd-colored. Then disappearing, one by one, in a shriek of wind and flying paper. 

And then, quiet. 

Seiji takes a breath, stands with carefully maintained poise. 

Shuuichi too, is standing. Eyes wide behind his glasses, shoulders still shaking minutely. There's a paper chain curled around his elbow, another looped around his left wrist and his fingers. 

Someone moves forward to count the jars, holds up their fingers. Eight. 

Seiji finds he has one hand curled around Shuuichi's wrist, his eyes scanning Shuuichi's face. Without knowing exactly when he had done so, he had left his seat and crossed the protective barrier. 

"The champion," Seiji says. His other hand rises to Shuuichi's jaw, and sand clings to his finger as he smooths it away, Shuuichi's face turning with the motion. 

It is easy after that, to step closer and press his lips to Shuuichi's own. 

The sudden silence around his ears is almost as satisfying as the moment when Shuuichi leans in. 

 

*

 

"Exhibitionism, Seiji?" Shuuichi reprimands later. "I imagine your relatives weren't pleased." Despite his words, he's smiling as he says it, expression skirting on the edge of wicked. 

"Even I," Seiji says, "can be carried away in a moment. It was an impressive showing, after all." 

"Speaking of shows," Shuuichi says, and Seiji feels tightened fingers around his hand, "I have an extra ticket next month."

"Another film?"

"Not exactly," Shuuichi says, quirks up one side of his mouth. "How much do you know about dancing?"

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> **lady_peony** : *makes a shrugging emoji face*  
> someday i would like to see one of them get into a fistfight or something, but this seemed more plausible imo.

**Works inspired by this one:**

  * [Imperfection](https://archiveofourown.org/works/5202572) by [darkcyan](https://archiveofourown.org/users/darkcyan/pseuds/darkcyan)
  * [crossroads](https://archiveofourown.org/works/9499154) by [darkcyan](https://archiveofourown.org/users/darkcyan/pseuds/darkcyan), [meguri_aite](https://archiveofourown.org/users/meguri_aite/pseuds/meguri_aite)




End file.
